John Schettler - Fallen Angels - 9 Days Falling, Volume II

Lord almighty! We took three bad hits! He hadn’t seen anything like this since that bomb that almost killed Lucky Bird Ernie, and he was off at a run to help manhandle a fire hose forward to fight the fire.

“Let’s move it!” he shouted. “That’s my plank out there!”

The damage control team fought its way forward behind two fire hoses, slowly getting good streams of water on the fires. Twenty minutes later they had doused the fire well, but it was still smoking badly, and in that time the ship had listed another five degrees.

“Hey, where you going, Lewis?” It was Merle Hart from the plumbing shop.

“I’m going up there to get my goddamned plank,” said Lewis. “Can’t you see this list? Why aren’t you down below with a wrench plugging leaks, Merle? This isn’t looking good here. Another five degrees and we could tip right over. Look how they’re trying to secure those planes!” He pointed at a crew of five airmen who were desperately trying to stabilize three Corsairs on the aft flight deck.

Lewis had taken up a crow bar in his strong right arm and went forward through the blowing smoke, his feet unsteady on the wet, tilted deck. He managed to keep his footing until he worked his way very near the torn metal gridding near the fire they had been fighting. There, beneath a segment of overlaid metal grills, he saw the original wooden flight deck.

This place is as good as any other, he thought, and he knelt down to wedge his crowbar into the deck where a wood plank seemed nice and loose. He was going to get his plank, one way or another. Then he was going to go back to his bunk and get the certificate of ownership too!

As for CV-18, her proud career would soon be over. The damage below decks when the boiler exploded had compromised two more bulkheads, and they collapsed under the searing heat of the fires. The Captain, Wendel G. “Windy” Switzer, had seen enough to realize the ship was down for the count. He gave the order to flood all magazines and to try counter-flooding to correct the list but the fire in the main island had now merged with the inferno below the forward 5 inch battery, and those magazines could not be flooded. They exploded not long after Lewis had retreated below decks with his plank, and the damage to the port side of the ship was now fatal.

CV Wasp was going to sink again, and Captain Vladimir Karpov now had the dubious distinction of sinking the same carrier, at least by name, twice. She would not be present years later when the Gemini capsules returned to earth, and another US carrier would have to pluck Stafford, Lovell and other intrepid Gemini Astronauts from the sea. The Union Minerals and Alloys Corp. of New York City, would have to buy some other ship in 1973 when the venerable lady was decommissioned and sold for scrap. There would never be another ship in the US Navy by that name again—it was officially retired.

The sinking of the Wasp put a set of strange bookends on the war, with CV-7 sunk just before it began to herald its terrible onset, and CV-18 sunk just after it ended, warning of a new conflict in the making at that very moment. Just what that conflict might entail, no man knew at that moment. In fact, all history was waiting for the outcome of the battle now engaged, for it would all be re-written from this moment forward. None of this had ever happened in the timeline that had brought Kirov through the war and safely into Vladivostok in the year 2021. This was all new.

As for Gunner’s Mate 3rd Class Alfred J. Lewis, he made it to his bunk, and also made it off the ship with his plank. In fact, it kept him afloat until he could be picked up by a destroyer, and he held on to it for dear life—all his life, along with his certificate of ownership.

The hit to Bataan was not as bad, though they did lose five Hellcats on the flight deck there. That said, Ziggy Sprague was shocked to realize that he had suddenly lost a fleet carrier and was watching another escort carrier burn, and this without even knowing who or what it was that had attacked his task group! He was furious and on the radio to Halsey at once.

“Goddammit Bull! We just got hit up here! Wasp is a burning wreck and I think we’ll lose her. She’s listing bad and they can’t seem to correct it. Windy Switzer is giving the order to abandon ship. What the hell’s going on? Why are you coming out to the mound now when we’re right in the middle of this thing?”

“Sorry, Ziggy. It has nothing to do with you, but I’ve got two more task groups in the bullpen, if that’s what you mean. Recover your strike wave and hold tight. I’m bringing the whole shit and shebang up north to reinforce you. Admiral Fraser has opened my eyes on what this threat may be up north. Apparently it’s a fast battlecruiser with advanced rocket weapons, and it’s been giving the Brits nightmares.”

“Yeah? Well I’ve got some bad dreams to deliver as well. There’s nothing wrong with the rest of my group, particularly North Dakota and South Carolina . Suppose I let the big guns roll on up north for a closer look? And I’ve still got ninety planes in reserve—at least until we got hit just now. We can recover our first strike wave, refuel and rearm in a couple hours and be ready to rumble again.”

“Did you see what hit Wasp?”

“Hell if I know. Didn’t see but a blur just before she went up in smoke. We had nothing on radar either. It just came out of nowhere.”

“That’s what Admiral Fraser told me. Look, Ziggy, this varmint has one hell of an anti-air defense too, and you have to swarm it to get anything through—just like we did with Yamato. We threw 380 planes against that ship. We do the same with this one when I get there. Fraser is bringing TF.37 up around the other side of Hokkaido as well. Between the three of us we’ll have damn near a thousand planes, and more behind them if we need to get Ballentine, McCain or anyone else up there. I’ve got over 300 ready aircraft right now. More coming.”

“Well don’t be all day about it. How far out are you?”

“We make it to be just under 150 miles south of you, and we’re coming fast. Look Ziggy, get your destroyers in tight on the carriers. Fraser laid a boatload on me as to how the Brits planned to fight this ship. Screen the carriers. Send your battleships northeast. We’re going to form a fast battleship task force and ram it down their throats while we hit them with every goddamn plane we have.”

“Now you’re talking,” said Sprague. “How’s my namesake doing?” He was referring to the odd quirk that had seen two men rise through the ranks to command fast carrier task groups, unrelated, but both bearing the surname Sprague. The second was Rear Admiral Thomas Sprague in carrier division three, also a part of Halsey’s fleet. The two ‘Spragues’ had also graduated from the same class at Naval Academy, and both served with distinction.

“We’ll call on Tom Sprague’s carriers if we need them,” said Halsey. “He’s replenishing now with Ballentine.”

“What in heaven’s name do the Russians think they’re doing, Bull? Are they flying these damn suicide rockets like the Japanese?”

“We don’t know. Which is why I want you and the other task group commanders aboard Missouri for a powwow ASAP. I’ll send you the details later. In the meantime, hold tight until we reinforce. Fraser says if you go in piecemeal this damn ship will cut you to pieces.”

“Our air group took a pretty hard knock, and the planes never even got close enough to the enemy to let them have it. Now it sure looks like we’re going to lose Wasp.”

“Plenty more coming,” Halsey reassured him. “I won’t let you down this time, Ziggy.”